I'm actually shocked by the level of misinformation and outright nonsense in Scsigs post, so my apologies, but this is going to be a long one...
Scsigs wrote: ↑Fri Jan 03, 2020 2:39 pm
It's all up to Manga UK, which IS part of FUNi's family, but mostly because they're both owned by Sony currently.
It isn't up to MangaUK. MangaUK distribute the home video, and they distribute Funimation's dub. No reason Netflix can't talk to Toei Europe instead. Allegedly Funimation hold MangaUK's same position in America, and yet Wow talked to Toei America when they were looking into Kai, and when Fathom Events did the cinema screenings of the movies, that was done through Toei rather than Funimation.
Scsigs wrote: ↑Fri Jan 03, 2020 2:39 pm
I imagine they own streaming rights
As I've said over and over and over and over and over again in this thread and others,
THAT'S NOT A THING.
Services get the rights to stream a show, but there's no mythical "Streaming rights" that would prevent Ocean's dub from airing. If Netflix chose to go with Funimation's dub, then that would stop Ocean's dub from airing, but only because Netflix would likely have an exclusive deal in whatever territory they chose, and the version they would have chosen in that scenario would not be Ocean's.
But if Netflix want to get Ocean's dub, there isn't anything to stop them. MangaUK may try to not offer it to them, if they talk to MangaUK instead of Toei Europe. But Netflix may be able to insist. We'll see. Ultimately, we actually don't know if MangaUK could refuse to offer it. Claiming to have any knowledge that would suggest any particular company could influence this is, frankly, ridiculous. Especially given what we learned from Westwood making their dubs in 2000-2005, we have no reason to believe anything other than the simple idea that distribution platforms can license and show whatever version they want.
Scsigs wrote: ↑Fri Jan 03, 2020 2:39 pm
or can get access to them through FUNi, since THEY own the rights for NA.
I'll say this, Funi do own the rights to stream Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball GT, and I think some of the movies in the USA. Because Funi have a streaming service that operates in the USA.
But those are simply the rights to stream those shows in the USA. Nothing more. And I'm pretty sure other countries can't sublicense these kinds of rights. It would be pretty weird if Netflix USA could sub-license UK Netflix's license to Star Trek Discovery. Or, to give a more accurate comparison given you're talking about Netflix licensing it through Funi, it'd be like Netflix USA sub-licensing CraveTV's license to Star Trek Discovery in Canada.
Though even this is imperfect, because Funi don't own the rights to stream Kai. So it'd be more like Netflix Canada sub-licensing the rights to stream Project GKR from Hulu. (Since no where is streaming GKR, so it couldn't be licensed from Hulu, and it doesn't make sense anyway because Netflix Canada is based in Canada and Hulu is in the USA, and they're separate companies. So you see, none of this makes any sense at all)
The only reason for all this confusion is that since Funimation produce a dub in addition to operating a streaming service, so whether it actually happened this way or not, it does look like anywhere that licenses a show dubbed by Funimation, licensed it from Funimation. So people assume Funimation has more pull than they actually have. There's no evidence for any of this thinking, it's just circumstantial connection of random dots.
Scsigs wrote: ↑Fri Jan 03, 2020 2:39 pm
As for Canada, FUNi still owns distribution rights &, unless they negotiate to license the Ocean dub for Kai, which they probably wouldn't do,
So, first off, as we saw with Wow, companies in Canada either usually talk to Toei of America, or they can do that if they wish. And if they talk to Toei America, then Toei America is happy to offer Ocean's version.
In theory, it may be an obstacle for Canada that Funimation's streaming service operates in North America. I THINK FuniNow doesn't operate in Canada, though?...
But, either way, it may not matter at all, in fact. Because, and this is the key thing, Funi aren't streaming Kai. So, even if there was an incredibly weird situation where the Canadian and USA rights were in one lump (which won't be a thing), or if FuniNow does actually operate in Canada (which may be the case, though I'm not sure it is), any exclusivity deals wouldn't apply to Kai, because no one is streaming it at the moment. So, especially since Kai is an older show and thus Toei have less reason to be weird about it, there's no reason Toei America can't give Ocean's Kai to Netflix CA, and there's also no reason that Toei Europe couldn't give Ocean's Kai to Netflix UK.
Scsigs wrote: ↑Fri Jan 03, 2020 2:39 pm
that's very unlikely to have the Canadian dub on NA Netflix when FUNi's is the default English dub & voice cast.
You say "NA Netflix" as if all of North America has one lump of streaming rights. Ultimately, Netflix CA and US do have two different sets of rights for streaming stuff (a lot of the difference comes down to the USA not being able to get shows that are exclusive to Hulu or HBO or whatever; in other words, it's the same situation as everywhere else in the world).
It's generally accepted that the way this works is that Netflix would have to acquire a license for a given show for each country separately. That's why every streaming service has a different catalogue in every country.
So, not only is "NA Netflix" not a thing, but there's also the matter of "FUNi's is the default English dub & voice cast". While it is true that they are really the only voice cast that the USA has known, and they are the voice of the video games, Dragon Ball hasn't been airing on Canadian TV, and it's not streaming anywhere, so most people in Canada only really know Dragon Ball from when they watched it as a kid when it was on TV around 1998-2006(ish). Yes I know there's DVDs, but do you really think people watched it more on DVD than they did on TV back in the day? And do you really think people watch DVDs more than they watch streams?
And aside from a chunk of episodes in the middle of Z, Canada always had Ocean's dubs.
Ultimately though, I think you underestimate how much people care about the Funi cast. You assume people care, but I think that's a silly assumption to make. Dragon Ball is always popular, whatever dub airs, so the regular fans will just be happy to get Dragon Ball. (And any average joe who just picked up the DVDs in Canada & the UK and watched that version won't care either)
But, there are a lot of fans who are big on the idea of the Ocean dub, because that's the version they grew up on. So, if there's any preference in Canada or the UK, it'll be for the Ocean dub. That's what we're seeing from the attention this Tweet is getting so far, that's what we're seeing from the hundreds of pages of this thread, etc. Even those who aren't Ocean fanboys are curious to hear it.
So, it's not as clear cut as you put it. And ultimately, maybe this number of people is small, it's hard to say. But, there's no particular plus or minus to either dub from Netflix's point of view, aside from demand. Netflix follow the demand. If we show there's demand for Ocean's dub, then just like with Wow, they'll give it a go. (Of course, Wow's channel never got off the ground, that's where that stalled, sadly)
Funi's and Ocean's dubs are ultimately both Dragon Ball, but Ocean's is having demand shown for it, and Netflix are kind of competing against Funi anyway, so... Long as we push for it, I see no reason for Netflix not to try for it.
So... If I may speak freely, I'd appreciate you stopping being a nitpicking naysayer. You're bringing up all kinds of nonsense reasons why this "probably won't happen", and all it's doing is taking space up in this thread where we're all reiterating the same vague understandings of the behind the scenes of this, and we don't get anywhere.
So I say, this is quite a simple situation, really:
Either you're interested in this dub airing, and you should support that Tweet (it's doing pretty well), or you don't care, and you should bugger off, frankly. Because coming in here and giving all kinds of nonsense reasons why it might not happen is conversationally useless, and ultimately just a little frustrating, when it's the same stuff we've been hearing for ten years, that's never been substantiated, that's almost entirely based on a massive misunderstanding of how all of this works, and it just takes us in circles without any constructive conversation resulting from it.
Apologies if that's harsh, I just find these kinds of circular, repetitious, naysaying sentiments annoying, and I wanted to nip it all in the bud so we don't have to do this dance again. We've had these discussions over and over again, and the best the naysayers who bring this up can do is "well i don't think it'll air because i still think funi is more popular and there's streaming rights or something", which is hard to argue with because there's no evidence to back it up, so clearly that belief isn't founded on any actual concrete founding, so it's hard to dissuade.
The point of Dragon Ball is to enjoy it. Never lose sight of that.